Introduction

All the operations I talked about in the post Mathematical Morphology can be easily implemented in OpenCV. It even supports several advanced morphological operations, right out of the box! So lets begin with, creating a custom structuring element.

Creating a structuring element

There's a dedicated function that creates structuring elements. It lets you create standard structuring elements very easily. Creating custom elements is also easy.

IplConvKernel* cvCreateStructuringElementEx(int cols,
                                            int rows,
                                            int anchor_x,
                                            int anchor_y,
                                            int shape,
                                            int* values=NULL);

Most of the parameters are quite self explanatory.

cols and rows is the number of columns and rows in the structuring element

anchor_x and anchor_y point to the anchor pixel. The pixel that is checked for when the transformation should be made or not.

shape lets you choose from three standard structuring elements. Or, if you want, you can set it to use a custom structuring element:

• CV_SHAPE_RECT
• CV_SHAPE_CROSS
• CV_SHAPE_ELLIPSE
• CV_SHAPE_CUSTOM

If you set shape to CV_SHAPE_CUSTOM, you must somehow supply the custom element. This is done using values. This parameter is used only if shape is set to custom.

values should be a 2D matrix, corresponding to the structuring element itself.

If values is NULL (and shape is custom), then all points in the structuring element will be considered nonzero (a rows*cols sized rectangle).

Dilation

This operation is the basic building block of morphology. So there's a function dedicated for this.

void cvDilate(const CvArr* src,
              CvArr* dst,
              IplConvKernel* element=NULL,
              int iterations=1);

The function takes four parameters:

• src: The image you want to dilate
• dst: This is where the dilated image is stored
• element: (optional) The structuring element (use cvCreateStructuringElementEx to create one). If not specified, a 3x3 square is used.
• iterations: (optional) Number of times you want to dilate src. If not specified, this is set to 1.

This operation is in-place. You can use the same image as src and dst.

Erosion

Erosion is also a basic function of morphology. There's a function dedicated for this as well:

void cvErode(const CvArr* src,
             CvArr* dst,
             IplConvKernel* element=NULL,
             int iterations=1);

The parameters are the same as dilation. Just that you perform an erosion instead of dilation.

• src: The image you want to erode
• dst: This is where the eroded image is stored
• element: (optional) The structuring element (use cvCreateStructuringElementEx to create one). If not specified, a 3x3 square is used.
• iterations: (optional) Number of times you want to erode src. If not specified, this is set to 1.

This is also an in-place operation. src and dst can point to the same image.

Composite Operations

OpenCV has a function that lets you do composite morphological operations as well. These operations include:

1. Opening
2. Closing
3. Morphological Gradient
4. Top Hat
5. Black Hat

The one function that lets you do all this is:

void cvMorphologyEx(const CvArr* src,
                    CvArr* dst,
                    CvArr* temp,
                    IplConvKernel* element,
                    int operation,
                    int iterations=1);

Again, the parameters are very similar to cvDilate and cvErode (sigh, morphology is so monotonous :P)

• src: The image you want to work on
• dst: This is where the final result is stored
• element: (optional) The structuring element (use cvCreateStructuringElementEx to create one). If not specified, a 3x3 square is used.
• operation: This is the only parameter that differs from the previous functions. Its possible values are:
  • CV_MOP_OPEN
  • CV_MOP_CLOSE
  • CV_MOP_GRADIENT
  • CV_MOP_TOPHAT
  • CV_MOP_BLACKHAT If you're not sure what each of these means, have a look at these articles.
• iterations: (optional) Number of iterations. If not specified, this is set to 1.

Other operations

If you want to do other operations, you must write your own code. Mostly you'll have to do the following tasks in some order:

• Subtract/add images
• Multiply an image by a scalar
• Erode/dilate
• Create a custom structuring element

You already know how these are done! So you're ready to take on any composite operation in mathematical morphology that you can think of!

Summary

OpenCV lets you perform several morphological operations very easily. You can even write your own morphological functions through OpenCV without any problems!